The Jar
by flawedesires
Summary: The story of Pandora, the first woman.


Special.

Beautiful.

Immortal.

Divine.

Dazzling.

So many words to describe her. Too many.

Zeus watches with hidden pleasure as the gods gather to craft her. Hephaestus carves her shape from the finest, glittering marble that could be found. Her lips are created from shining rubies, her eyes fashioned from sparkling sapphires, her hair from the softest silk. Aphrodite and her lovely attendants, the Three Graces, drape her in the most gorgeous taffetas and deck her with the loveliest jewels. Athena, lady of wisdom, breathed life into her. Hermes gifts her with the fleetest of foot, Artemis with a tameness for animals, and so on.

Zeus himself places into the mind of this beautiful creature insatiable curiosity. He presents her with a jar that he instructs she is never to open, for it will be the end of mankind. The gods' creation smiles winningly and gives her word she will not, though deep in her head she wonders what the jar may hold. Yet she closes her lovely mouth and says nothing.

Hermes takes her delicate hand and leads her to the world of the mortals, where she is admired far and wide for her gifts. She is offered by the gods to the Titan Epimetheus, the brother of the prophetic Prometheus, for a bride.

The Titan had been warned by his brother never to accept a gift from the gods, for he could see the future and knew what would happen. But Epimetheus could see nothing but the first woman's dizzying beauty, and gladly took her for his wife.

There, among the mortals, she is known as Pandora, or all-gifted. Many travel from all corners of the earth to revel in her divine-like beauty. She smiles prettily.

Pandora lives in joyful ignorance of the gods' plan with her new husband Epimetheus. But the curiosity in her tugs at her thoughts tantalizingly, and repeatedly her gaze drifts to the tall, elegant jar standing silently in the corner of her chamber.

She reminds herself the god king ordered her never to open it, remembering the fate of man if she dared to do so. But the curiosity—proving to be a terrible curse rather than a divine blessing—urges her in honeyed voices to open it. To break the seal, lift the heavy lid, glance discreetly inside.

The dreaded day arrives almost without notice.

Pandora rises with Apollo's chariot, dressing gracefully in her lovely garments and jewels before gliding to eat her dainty meal of emerald olives, freshly baked bread, and watered wine.

Again her eyes slide to the jar. It seems to beckon her forward, beseeching her to simply peek inside, only for a moment. She attempts to restrain herself, yet again telling herself the unknown consequences.

But finally she must.

She wipes the olive oil from her ruby lips with silk cloth. She steps quietly to kneel before the beautifully painted jar, gazing with momentary hesitation at its engraved images.

She lifts a delicate hand and carefully breaks the seal. She glances about her one last time before rising and ever so slowly lifting the lid.

The force of the explosion throws her back into the wall. She screams in terror as the jar releases the very evils Zeus warned her against: Jealousy, Greed, Gossip, Lies, Theft, Deceit, Distrust, Scheming, Accusation, Despair. They swarmed over the earth and infected man with their evil diseases within mere moments.

Pandora scrambles to her feet, slamming the lid to the jar's mouth in feverish desperation, keeping the last fluttering object inside: Elpis, the spirit of hope. She sobs aimlessly against the cold tiles of the floor. What had she done?

Zeus, high on Olympus, smiles cruelly. Pandora's fatal mistake is exactly what he intended. Prometheus's dear creation would pay dearly for the Titan's crime.

As man becomes corrupted with the jar's evil contents, killing, pillaging, robbing, and cursing, Pandora begins to fade silently from the world of the mortals.

The first, beautiful, woman forgotten under the chaos of the new, evil world.

Her role had been fulfilled.

Her place was empty.

Her memory lost.

Even when the gods razed mankind to nothing.

Pandora was gone.


End file.
